


An innocent smoke on the balcony

by marcoa



Category: Indian Summers (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-04
Updated: 2017-01-04
Packaged: 2018-09-14 20:29:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9201407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marcoa/pseuds/marcoa
Summary: An oblique encounter at the club has an unforeseen conclusion.





	

“Mr Dalal”.  
She motioned to him imperiously with a thin finger. Beneath a large hat made mostly of lace and feathers, her eyes shone from a sallow and weather beaten face. No amount of parasol use now could hide the years of sunshine she’d endured under the Indian sky.  
Even out on the balcony it was impossible to feel completely alone. A jazz trumpet blared out of the gramophone, although muted down the corridors of the club. A low background murmur accompanied it on the breeze, the sound of a score of hurried conversations delighting over who had done what with whom over the past months.  
A cigarette burned low in Aafrin’s hand as he gazed at her, willing to look through her, at anything else in truth rather than this muslin sack of bitterness and spent gin bottles.  
“Mrs Coffin”. He took a drag of the cheap cigarette, noxious smoke tickling his throat. It made no sense to continue smoking them, but they evoked certain memories he wasn’t done with yet. His forehead furrowed as she stood there, in the empty frame of the doorway, just looking at him.  
“How may I help you?” His mouth made a tortured shape, striving to force a smile and failing, inverting and drooping at the corners.  
Cynthia smiled back. It was sad. Old. Malicious.  
“I know, you know”. A cigarette holder appeared in her hand, a cigarette transfixed and somehow already lit. She brought it to her mouth, drew, and blew a smoke ring. Her mouth stayed in the shape of an o, the pink of the interior of her mouth bright through the haze of smoke.  
All of a sudden her tongue darted up towards the roof of her mouth, a lizard movement, and licked the underside of her top lip.  
“I know. And now you know. Naughty boy”. She paused to smile again, facial muscles creaking with the repeated effort. “Naughty munshi”.  
Aafrin’s frown deepened. He opened his mouth to speak, and closed it again with an audible snap. He reached behind him to grip the balustrade, the planed wood smooth and cool and comforting against his skin. He took another drag on his cigarette, now almost spent, as coolly as he could manage. He could feel the sweat beginning to form on his forehead.  
“Mrs Coffin, I’m sure I don’t understand what you mean”. He turned and flicked the stub of cigarette out over the side of the balcony, not looking where it would land.  
“Oh, my dear boy”, she cooed, closer to him now. “Let’s not play games, shall we, hmm?”  
She was then at his side, leaning on the balustrade next to him, the feather peaking from the top of her hat almost touching his face. She was so close he could smell the verbena water on her neck, its cloying scent almost drowning out the strong aroma of the magnolia trees in the garden.  
“I never wanted you here, you or your family”. She took a deep breath and sighed. Resignation. “I own this club, but I can’t control it. Not any more. Not with Ralph, and Willingdon, and Mr bloody Baldwin in charge of things. Things are not as they were”.  
Cynthia turned to look at him, a feather – peacock, of course – brushing his cheek on the way past.  
“But because I can’t control it, it doesn’t mean I have no control”. Another puff on the cigarette. The feather twitched in the breeze.  
“Mrs Coffin, I really must return to my family. I’m sure my appa is boring your patrons silly with his war stories”. He lifted his elbows off the balustrade and made to leave, but a touch on his elbow stopped him.  
“Life can become very difficult for a naughty munshi if certain things become more widely known. And with the people I know, that can be very wide”.  
Aafrin stopped dead, his body suddenly rigid. The breeze ran icily through his suit.  
“What do you want of me, Mrs Coffin?” he asked, eyes fixed on the doorway in front of him.  
“Of you, dear Mr Dalal?” she trilled. “Oh, nothing. Nothing much at all”. A thin fingertip jabbed his shoulder blade through the thin linen and snaked down his back, ending in the small of his back. A waft of floral scent momentarily engulfed his senses.  
“Nothing yet, Mr Dalal. Look at me. Look. At. Me”.  
Aafrin turned by juddering degrees to stare her in the face, black eyes to brown, shaven face to rouged wrinkles.  
“That’s right, dear boy. Who’s a good munshi?”  
His eyes narrowed, the hands at his side curling into fists, his nostrils flaring over a mouth of suddenly tightly set teeth.  
“Please don’t call me that, Mrs Coffin”.  
She laughed, an uncharacteristically girlish sound, like crystal breaking.  
“You’d better get used to what you can ask for from me. Remember who I know, and what I can do to you”. She paused for effect. “And to Alice”. She smirked and let the words sink in.  
Aafrin turned back to face out over the balcony and into the grounds. Along the path the lamp lighters were at work, turning the dusk to day, revealing what was hidden in shadows.  
“That’s right. Remember your place”.  
She took another drag of the cigarette. Aafrin inhaled the exhaled smoke deeply, fighting the urge to light one himself.  
“Speaking of place”, she said lightly. “I keep a room in town. Very discrete. Here’s the address”. She pressed a square of paper into his hand. “Be there tomorrow evening at seven”.  
She looked him up and down, then picked a piece of fluff off his lapel. She rolled it between her fingers before flicking it aside over the side of the balcony with a smile.  
“And wear something…nice. After all”, she added, “a woman has expectations”.


End file.
